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In Reply to: Re: Street cleaning posted by Selfish Systemite on September 06, 2007 at 21:17:57:
Dude, I don't know if you are a parent yourself or not, but I tell you one thing, once you are, your number one priority is giving them the best shot at living a productive, sucessful, & happy life as possible. Everything else takes back burner second to that. And I don't care what you went through. I probably had my emotional & physical chain yanked by leaders more than many, & paid a big price. We all could probably have a "dick measuring" contest to see who suffered the most, but honestly once we are a free-thinking adults I belive it is to every one of us SGAs benefit regardless of our past experinces, to learn from & shed that stuff, because only then do I believe we will be able to accomplish our goals & be productive to society, & when & if we have kids, hopefully become the parents that many of us wish we had had.
I just don't buy all this "they should be paying taxes, or doing community service", how about they should love their kids, spend time with your grandkids, start doing something that really makes a difference.
When we all left the cult it was freakin' hard just to cover the basics of paying rent & putting food on the table. Well, add 20 years of age, health problems,etc. & then "paying back taxes" & "picking up trash". I don't feel sorry for them, but when I see grown adults living in the past as if it was yesterday, honestly I feel like "get a life". I blame their parents, yes, but once FGAs are doing everything in their power to do a 180, I believe we should give them some breating room. Their having to begin everything at the age of 50-55 in my opinion is darn right punishment enough in inself, & you couldn't pay me to be in their shoes.
On the subject of "paying back taxes" most of our parents (& us)lived on so little we would have been considered below the poverty line in many cases by western standards & the only "back taxes" that I can think of would have to be paid in "provisioned" food. I don't know how much good that would do the IRS.
Honestly, I think we need more realistic solutions that will actually bring progress & as a result ultimately help those whom our parents,- the FGAs-, owe the most to, & that is their KIDS & GRANDKIDS as the case may be.
The other point, is although you may not have parents in this situation, those of us who do (or hope to) should like nothing more than to see them get financially stable themselves so that they can stand on their own feet & not have to live on wellfare, or have to be supported by their kids who do have decent jobs. So that whole community service "solution" could backfire on US when WE have to pick up the tab for our parents not having had a decent chance to get a job, buy a house, etc. Hell, I think they should be encouraged to make as much money as fast & furiously as they can!!
I know that we all see this elephant (more like a monster sometimes) from different angles becuase we are all different people & what to one guy/ or girl was simply "weird" to someone else was "horrible". So I don't want to take anything away from what you feel & what you may have gone through, but to summarize I would venture to say that we SGAs as a whole are better off taking what is left our our lives, be they buffetted & marred as they, & investing in building positive environments with our FGA parents involved when possible so that our kids (their grandkids)have some sort of legacy, rather than throwing it all away since, Heck, all we have to look forward to in the future is "roaming dinosaurs".
